News and insider tips about travel in the United States and to International destinations. Visits to exotic locations and unexpected adventures. Restaurant reviews. Secrets known only to locals. My travel articles also appear in Luxury Travel Magazine, New York Daily News & Westways Magazine

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After his trip to Austin checking out the local food truck culture, our traveling foodie, David Latt, liked Texas so much he headed back in search of great barbecue and steaks. On a short visit, he took the long view and ate in twenty-five restaurants in thirty-six hours.

I hadn't gone shooting since I was a kid, so the instructor's saying the shotgun "will kick a bit" was good to know.

Overhead, the sky was deep blue. You could hear traffic from the interstate a few miles away, but otherwise the air was hot, still and quiet. Hands sweating, two shells loaded into the shotgun, one eye squinted closed, the other aimed down the barrel, I was ready. "Pull," I said and from the left, the hockey sized puck flew into the sky.

I moved the barrel of the shotgun to follow the skeet as it arced in the sky. The puck seemed to move in slow motion when it reached its highest point. That's when I slowly squeezed the trigger and...missed.

It's summer. Time to follow the sweet smoke that drifts from smokers and grills in rural Texas, Alabama and North Carolina all the way to the busy streets of Brooklyn and Chicago. The basics are the same everywhere. Slabs of meat and poultry spend hours in giant metal ovens until, stained by heat and smoke, they are sliced, chopped and pulled, served with an assortment of salads, sides of steamed, braised or roasted vegetables and slices of white bread or chunks of corn bread. The application of barbecue sauce--sweet, tangy or tongue-burning hot--completes the experience.

Something about barbecue creates fanatics.
Diners with sticky fingers, wave their bones in the air as they debate whether or not dry rub by itself or a combination of dry rub and sauce brings out the best flavors in the meat. Hunched over a plate of pulled pork, people can argue for days about how long to smoke, which sauce is best (sweet and hot and thick or thin with a vinegary bite), and what k…